Chapter Text
Peter had been living with V for two years now. Things weren't always easy, especially when his already hectic schedule was interrupted to go to the bodega on the corner and buy tater tots and chocolate. The two things were probably seventy five percent of his diet. Another fifteen percent was the vegetables and proteins that Aunt May managed to get into him during their weekly dinners.
The other ten percent. Well. There was protein. A lot of it. It just also happened to be living when he ate it. When Venom ate it.
It was people. It was fully living people.
At least the two of them had agreed that V was only allowed to eat criminals, and bad ones at that.
What had started as an agreement that every now and then, V could come over him and eat a really bad guy, had become something else. Now, every time there was a really bad guy, Venom just exploded over him and ate them.
And like, yeah. Peter should be pissed about it. He didn't believe in killing. Everyone could change, right? But when V decided they were going to eat the guy that he'd already stopped from raping women three times? Maybe the symbiote was making him a little more bloodthirsty but he couldn't really find it in himself to be all that beat up over it.
Thankfully, Peter and V seemed to agree on what the 'really bad ones' were. They didn't go after car jackers, aside from the one time that the guy had stabbed the woman in the shoulder, and they barely even bothered with purse snatchers aside from scaring the shit out of them. But rapists? Guys menacingly following after people in the dark places between street lights? Yeah, that was another story.
Peter had honestly lost track of the sexual predators V, and by extension himself, had eaten. He'd always thought that people that preyed on others that way were the worst. But there was a step lower than that, somehow.
The ones that preyed on kids. Those were the ones that Venom had instantly picked up on as being fair game. They hadn't even had to discuss it. As much as Peter said that he believed everyone could change and could be better, he didn't believe it for those types. And V was so close to him, right in his inner thoughts. They saw it and knew it. The first time they'd eaten a kindergarten teacher that followed her male students into the bathroom and 'helped them clean themselves up', Peter had thrown up afterward, but Venom hadn't offered any comfort. They knew that it wasn't disgust at the idea of killing that had done anything, not with that person as their meal. They knew very well that it was because she had been the first time they'd eaten someone outside of the heat of battle.
So yeah, he had a bit of a soft spot for kids. He didn't think it was anything extraordinary because kids deserved that, right? Kids deserved to be innocent and protected for as long as possible. They didn't deserve abuse of any kind. They should be protected at all costs.
So, Peter was scoping out a guy that set his reflexes off. The problem with his Spidey senses was that they were pretty passive. If someone wasn't doing something dangerous right then, they weren't much. Yeah, he got some feedback from people planning things, but it was pretty much impossible to tell the difference between 'frustrated guy calming himself down by pretending he'd have enough guts to hold up the bank he worked at' and 'actual murderer planning a kill'. So he couldn't really do anything about those minor things. He had to wait for the major things.
But for the last month, when he walked by the elementary school on his way home from his job at the donut shop, right as they let out for the afternoon, there'd been this guy. He wasn't close enough to be there for pickup, but he hadn't been far enough away for it to be coincidence that he was near. It had just.. Sent Peter to humming. So he followed him.
Tonight, he'd followed him all sorts of places. To the library, where he'd left with God knows what in the little bags they gave out. It wasn't like Peter could follow him in without being forced to run a story hour. Then, he went to a hardware store, where he'd left with a few huge 'bin liners' and a saw. Then, he'd gone to a quiet block.
A quiet block that happened to have one Mary Ellen Brooks on the third floor, apartment 3f. She went to Lakeville Elementary School in Queens, New York, she was seven years old. The school let out at three fifteen every afternoon, right when Peter Parker was walking by on his way from the Donut Conspiracy to the closest subway station that would take him back to his mediocre apartment.
And, honestly, he just couldn't think of a good reason why this man was here. Not with a backpack full of bin liners and a saw and the random 'goodies' he'd gotten from the library.
But still, Peter waited. He was in his suit, black and red after hearing too many complaints that V didn't like blue, on a wall and watching. He couldn't put this man in jail for nothing, even if it looked more and more like he'd just 'disappear without a trace' like a handful of other people in the last two years.
Peter was on the wall of the next building, watching as the man counted windows and then started up the fire escape. He got to the second floor before Peter decided he didn't really need any more evidence. There was nothing good going to come out of this situation. He dropped down in front of him, opening his mouth to deliver some scathing remark, but he didn't get the chance.
Eat him. V didn't wait for him to agree, considering they'd both been assuming it would happen. Peter just felt that strange pulling tingle across his skin as Venom exploded over his skin and then just engulfed the man, backpack and all.
When Venom released him, Peter lost his balance for a second, stumbling and putting his hand on the bar of the fire escape to stay standing.
"Oh. Em. Gee." A voice, rough and deep, came from nowhere. Peter whipped his head around to find it, finding something he hadn't expected to see. There was a man there, standing on the sidewalk under them, but it wasn't just a man. He was dressed in red and black leather, head to toe, with guns strapped to his hips and thighs, knives on his calves, and two katanas on his back. Peter stared for a second, not at all sure what he was looking at. "I mean, here I was, out watching an apartment building after it was brought to my attention that some fucking creep was watching a kid a little too close. And then that creep shows up! I was all ready to get my unaliving on, ya know, and then here comes our Friendly Neighborhood Spiderman, and he fucking eats him. Honestly, I don't think I've ever been this hard in my life."
Eat him? It was the first time in Peter's memory that V didn't sound confident and demanding. This also wasn't their, rarely used but still fairly common, begging tone. This was confusion.
Usually, Peter was good about not talking to his hitchhiker out loud when they were in public. The truth of the matter was that they were a secret. He'd distanced himself from the Avengers after he'd picked them up, only showing up when the battle was in full swing and ducking back out as soon as the cleanup started. There was no way that anyone could know about V, especially SHEILD, because Peter would end up on a table with some mad scientists over him.
But tonight he'd just narrowly stopped something terrible from happening to a sweet seven year old girl and been caught red-handed with his friendly black parasite eating someone. By a man with a lot of weapons. "V, we've been over this. We can't just eat people that don't deserve it."
Peter could feel V being restless under his skin and he knew that he would be able to see it if he looked under his suit. He saw. He could tell. No experiments. Eat him!
"Yeah, I don't think that was for us, either." The man scratched at his mask, like he would if he had his hair out. "You okay there, Spidey? If I get a say in it, I'd like to vote for not eating me. Like, I'd survive, but I'd really, really like to never figure out what it feels like to regenerate from literal shit."
He tilted his head before launching himself over the side of the fire escape. Since the cat was out of the bag, he let Venom attach to the railing so he could drop slowly, landing lightly in front of the man, but hopefully too far for an easy attack. Of course, he had guns, so maybe not. Peter would just have to hope he was faster. "Um, who are you?"
The man put his hand to his heart like Peter had just shot him. "You don't know who I am? Will the tragedy that is my life never get better? Will the cruel hand of fate never gift me with one good thing? Will-"
Peter shot him in the face with a tiny bit of web, making the man cut off with a squawk. Obviously, it didn't actually stop him talking since his whole face was covered in a mask/hood combo, but it worked so he wasn't going to complain. "I'm all about waxing poetical about the cruelties of life, but maybe you could pick it up after the introduction? I know a great poetry bar and they have slam poetry nights on Tuesdays."
The man struck a ridiculous pose, twisting almost comically so that his behind and his chest were both somehow facing Peter. "Deadpool, infamous Merc with a Mouth, at your service." Somehow, his mask looked like he was winking. "But you, my sexy Spider, can call me Daddy."
Peter choked and then started laughing, softly at first and then harder as the ridiculousness of the situation really hit him. Deadpool looked delighted. When Peter finally got himself back under control, he shook his head. "Okay, first of all, I've never called anyone Daddy and I really don't plan on doing so because that is just.. No." He put his hand out for him to shake. "Deadpool is fine. I'm Spiderman. Nice to meet you."
Deadpool grabbed his hand and started shaking it, far too forcefully and enthusiastically, but it made Peter smile behind his mask. Judging by the introduction and the staggering amount of weapons strapped to the man - was that a grenade? - he should be running away from him. But something in him found himself really liking the guy. He was.. Refreshing.
When Deadpool finally let go of his hand he made a fluttery motion with his fingers in the direction of Peter's head. "And the, uh, charming fellow in black?"
We will not eat him.
Peter grinned again in his suit. "That's Venom. But uh, alien, not a fellow. Genderless, really."
Deadpool nodded like he got introduced to genderless aliens that ate people every day. "Well, let me tell you, my intriguing and scary friend, you have excellent taste in meals."
Peter snorted. "Yeah, they really have a taste for a certain, uh, breeds of criminals."
The other man kissed his finger tips with an exaggerated sound, like a stereotypical Italian chef in those old TV shows. It made Peter chuckle a little. What a ridiculous man. Suddenly, he found himself tucked up close to Deadpool's side, an arm around his shoulders. Of course, that meant he had a black head full of teeth and glaring white eyes sticking out of the side away from the man, hissing and growling at the leather clad mercenary.
Somehow, the man took even that with grace. He casually removed his arm and stepped back, giving them the space they obviously wanted. "Sorry, sorry. I'm a touchy feely guy, but I'll try to hold it in check. I can see that you aren't quite ready for all that. Don't worry, though, I'll grow on you. Like mold. Or fungus. A particularly sexy fungus, like one of those poisonous ones that look cool, but that's neither here nor there."
Peter snorted and then relaxed when Venom finally went back under his skin. "Sorry, they're a little protective."
"No harm done, Spidey babe. I'm good." Deadpool gestured over his shoulder. "Want to get some food? I'm starving. Maybe you're not, since you had a pretty good meal not so long ago, but you can just watch me eat if you have a strong stomach."
Another snort and he was nodding. "Yeah, I'm hungry. I'm pretty much always hungry, courtesy of the enhanced metabolism."
Deadpool smiled under his mask, and Peter really wanted his hand on that technology because it looked cool as hell since he could see it on the mask. "So you're actually enhanced? I wasn't sure if it was just the spiffy suit." He actually shook his head after that. "I mean, now I know you've got some extra help, but I still wasn't sure."
"Yeah, I was bitten by a radioactive spider." He shrugged. "No big deal but I got some pretty sweet powers out of it. What about you?" It was a little weird to have this conversation, but he'd kind of missed talking to other people like this. Some people didn't talk about their origin stories, of course, but that was fine.
Wade shook his hands around, halfway between pushing the question aside and acting like it wasn't a big deal. "Oh, you know. Cancer and illegal human experimentation. Just the ush."
That didn't sound very usual to Peter, but he could read the tension in his shoulders. Even a rather socially oblivious man like himself could tell that he shouldn't push the issue. "So what are we eating?"
The tension disappeared out of his shoulders and Peter smiled slightly. "Well, it's practically a law that I have to do Mexican in every fic, but, honestly, I could really get behind some Chinese right now." He bounced for a few steps. "Or a pizza. There's a place a few blocks down that sells twenty four inch pizzas. We could order two of those and pig out on a rooftop."
God, that sounded so freaking good. Chocolate.
And there was the demanding tone again. He sighed. "My only request is that we stop and get a bottle of chocolate sauce."
Chocolate bar. Reeses. Donuts."
Peter sighed again. "Damn it, V. We don't need that much. Pick one."
Two.
"Yeah, fine. Two."
There was silence for a little while, though he could feel Deadpool's eyes on him. Sauce. And Reeses. The big ones. With the pieces inside.
Deadpool didn't mind stopping, and he laughed when he saw a bag full of one bottle of chocolate sauce and probably ten packs of Reeses. Peter shrugged and then they made their way to the pizza place.
Once they had their spoils, including two big bottles of soda, they made their way up a building and sat down together on the edge. Peter rolled his mask up over his nose and reached for the first pizza box. "Damn, baby boy, am I robbing the cradle in the fantasy world I've already created? I already got us married and we have two dogs and a baby on the way. But don't worry, we switch it up in the bedroom and do it with the lights off so you don't have to see me."
For a moment, Peter was too stunned to say anything. Then, he shook his head, a small smile on his face. "I'm twenty." He grabbed a slice of pizza and his bottle of chocolate sauce, covering it liberally before he took a bite.
That seemed to silence Deadpool for a moment. "Okay, that's legal, but like when are you going to be able to drink? If you can get drunk, I want to live vicariously through you one night." He reached for his own slice of pizza and then looked out toward the city before he rolled his own mask up, obviously uncomfortable if the tension in his shoulders was anything to go by. Peter assumed it was his face, since he'd noticed the comments about his appearance, and carefully didn't look at him. "And, really, chocolate on your pizza? What the fuck? I figured you wanted to go home and make a sundae or some chocolate milk."
"Few months." Peter shrugged and chewed his second bite. "V likes chocolate. I've had it on a lot of stuff. I've gotten used to some pretty weird combinations. It's why I never actually eat in restaurants, just order out when I can afford it."
Deadpool hummed around his giant bite of pizza.
They gorged on pizza and V even let him split a pack of Reeses with Deadpool. When they were finished, Peter could feel his phone vibrating in his pocket. That meant it was time to go home and sleep before he started his round of thankless jobs in the morning. He stood up and stretched. "Thanks for the food. Maybe I'll see you around again." He stood on the very edge of the building, preparing to throw himself off and swing home. "Oh, and Deadpool?" The man had his mask back in place, but he didn't say anything, just turned to look at him with his eyebrows up. "I'm a bottom." With that, he dove.
He wasn't quite far enough away to miss the very loud, very passionate words the other man let out. "Jesus fuck!"